HEROD I AS. 385- 



Distribution. Througliout Africa. The occurrence of this bird in 

 Cnclia is remarkable and somewhat mysterious. Mr. Blyth, in 

 1845-46, procured several specimens, all of immature birds, in the 

 Calcutta bazaar. None has been obtained near Calcutta since, 

 despite numerous enquiries by Hume and others, nor, so far as is 

 known, has a single specimen been collected elsewhere in India, 

 but in Ceylon two were shot, one in 1878 and another in 1879, and 

 a third was seen by Mr. Parker in 1880. Then Jerdon observed 

 a bird of this species at the foot of the Khasi Hills ; Hume saw six 

 huge Herons apparently of this species in Sind ; and I have twice 

 seen very large Herons, once by a tank at Bazargaon, near Nagpur, 

 and another time at Bam pur in Baluchistan. There can be no 

 doubt that a big Heron with a reddisli head and neck occurs in 

 India, but until an adult can be compared, it cannot be regarded 

 as certain that this bird is identical with the African A. goliath. 

 Should it prove distinct, it will bear Blyth's name A. nobilis. 



Genus HERODIAS, Boie, 1822. 



The true Egrets are Herons with pure white plumage at all 

 times and with, in the breeding-season, a dorsal train of feather? 

 elongate and " decomposed," i. e. with the barbs or rami separate 

 and distant from each other so as to form the ornamental plumes 

 or aigrettes from which the bird's name is derived. They are- 

 slenderer birds than those forming the genus Ardea, and have a 

 smaller, more compressed bill, and a very thin neck. Though all 

 very similar except in the breeding-season and only to be distin- 

 guished by size, they develop in the nuptial plumage different tufts 

 of ornamental feathers, and on this account the three Indian species- 

 are made by Sharpe the types of as many genera. 



Key to the Species. 



a. Neither crest nor breast-plumes; tarsus 5'2 to 



8-2in H. alba, p. 385. 



b. No crest ; breast-plumes in breeding-plumage ; 



tarsus about 4-5 H. intermedia, p. 386, 



c. Both crest and breast-plumes in breeding- 

 plumage ; tarsus about 3'75 H. garzetta, p. 387. 



All the Egrets associate together and have very similar habits. 

 They haunt marshes, paddy fields, tanks, rivers, and creeks, and 

 live on fish, inollusca, &c. They perch freely on trees and make 

 their nests on them. The nests are of sticks, and generally many 

 pairs of birds breed in company. 



1559. Herodias alba. The Large Egret. 



Ardea alba, Linn. Si/st. Nat. i, p. 239 (1766). 



Ardea egretta, Bechst. Naturg. DeutschL iii. p. 41 (1793) ; Hume, 



N. $ E. p. 613. 

 Ardea torra, Buck. Ham., Frankl. P. Z. S. 1831, p. 123; Salviidori,. 



Ann. Mus. Civ. Gen. (2) vii, p. 431. 

 VOL. i\. 2 C 



